NCT and developmental psychology: a welcome rapprochement

For over 50 years, developmental psychologists have conducted research around the world to understand the relation between culture and cognition. In fact, psychologists have been interested in this topic for over a century. In the late 1800s, Wundt introduced Elements of Folk Psychology, the study of how culture becomes part of higher psychological functioning (Cole, 1996). Cole even traces this inquiry back to Herodutus in the fifth century BC. In short, the question addressed by Flynn and her colleagues is not new. But this does not mean that it is insignificant or resolved. This thought-provoking essay contains many interesting ideas about how human culture and biology define and support one another. It also calls for collaboration between evolutionary biology and human developmental psychology, a worthwhile suggestion. The paper concentrates on Niche Construction Theory (NCT), the idea that organisms actively modify their environments, resulting in changes to the setting and organism that are transmitted over time. Human beings are not unique in niche construction; however, as the authors argue, they possess characteristics, including neurological features (plasticity) and capabilities (learning), that give human niche construction ‘a special potency’. Like developmental psychologists, Flynn et al. also contend that human niche construction largely unfolds during psychological growth. Four psychological approaches that emphasize social experience and cognitive functioning are highlighted: natural pedagogy, Activity Theory, distributed cognition, and situated cognition. These areas differ in developmental focus, with neither distributed nor situated cognition offering much account of psychological development. They also differ in assumptions about human nature; those who endorse natural pedagogy hold different views about the origins of human cognition from Activity Theorists. Two relevant developmental theories are missing, evolutionary developmental psychology (Bjorklund & Pelligrini, 2002) and sociocultural theory (though its basis is discussed with Vygotsky and Activity Theory) (Cole, 1996; Gauvain, 1995). Here I use these theories to describe the relevance of socioemotional development and sociogenesis to human niche construction. Evolutionary developmental psychology challenges a core idea of evolutionary psychology, a view based on mature systems in which human evolutionary change is largely about cognition. Cognition is certainly a chief component, as is evident in the vast potential of human learning. But the evolution of intelligence is also contingent on other species characteristics that underlie our ability to develop high levels of intellectual functioning in a single lifetime and that are tailored to the unique circumstances of growth. These features include, as previously stated, our social nature along with the immaturity of the brain at birth, the protracted developmental course, and the formation of emotional ties. Development does not happen by the child alone. As described in sociocultural theory, the social world provides the core experiences, interactions, and tools through which children learn and develop. The social context of human learning and development is simultaneously a cultural context. Human beings live in organized social units, or cultures, in which members share values, beliefs, and understandings about the world, participate in common practices and activities, and transmit information and ways of living across generations. Over development, as children participate in social interactions and other inherently social processes (e.g. using cultural tools and symbols that organize and support thinking), the behaviors and understandings of the culture become part of a child’s own thoughts and actions. As Flynn et al. explain, the foundations for learning socially emerge early; young infants show a bias toward